


Before you cut loose

by afraid of the dark (theaa)



Category: Victorious
Genre: F/M, rade
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-09
Updated: 2013-02-12
Packaged: 2017-11-28 17:25:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/676980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theaa/pseuds/afraid%20of%20the%20dark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jade West tries to get the hell out of most things. Call it an instinct. Now something is standing in her way, and she's considering doing something she doesn't have much experience in- staying. Very eventual endgame is Jade/Robbie. Heavy mentions of Beck/Jade.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Car Park

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, so I hope this will be my first multi-chapter fic. I can make no promises about when I'll be updating because I'm a lazy little sod, but I will do it. Enjoy?

_'I used to think one day they’d tell the story of us- how we met and the sparks fell instantly- but the story of us looks a lot like a tragedy now.’ - Taylor Swift, The Story Of Us_

..................

My breath spills out in front of my face, twisting into spirals and fogging in the cool night air, looking a lot like cigarette smoke as it slowly disappears. I wish I had a cigarette now, if only to distract myself from the look on his face as what I just said sinks in. Unfortunately, I gave up 3 months ago after ceaseless nagging from both Beck and my father. That might have to change. I miss the sensation of drawing the nicotine into my lungs, the brief moment of numbness it delivered. I need that now, but my back-up packet is sitting in the glove compartment of my battered Mustang, which is in the lot opposite. I’m not. Instead I’m standing outside The Black Box, with my leather jacket wrapped tightly around me, listening to other cars screech out of the lot as everyone leaves for the evening, after the play, their wheels spinning. Maybe I should have gone with them, left this for another day. I don’t get scared, but I’m pretty damn nervous of his reaction right now. I stare stubbornly down at the concrete, picking out the un-even bits, the faded white lines, the odds and ends of student life that have been deposited here; hair ties, screwed up paper, broken pens with their cartridges bleeding out into the pavement, blue into black, like a faded bruise, sensitive and not yet healed. I can’t meet his eyes, which I’m sure are watching me, or rather the top of my head. He’s still not speaking.

He draws breath. It’s long and shaky and rattles down his throat like it hurts him. It probably does. ‘You don’t think you love me anymore?’ I shake my head, no. Does he really want me to repeat it? I doubt either of us could take that. How I wanted this to be quick, and simple, like ripping off a Band-Aid .You have to do it with speed or it hurts all that much more and the marks it leave can be worse than the injury ever was. That’s what I thought- talk to him after his play, when he’s happy, so at least he’s still have something to cling to, to soften the blow so to speak, then do it quick. His play was good. He knows it. He also knows his relationship isn’t.

For the first time I look up, and his brown eyes are wide. But his face looks set, and his jaw is locked, his lips set in a thin line. It’s a look of resignation, I think. Neither of us speaks for a couple of seconds and I stay with my knee length laced up boots rooted to the spot. He wants to say more, I can tell- you don’t spend two years in a relationship with someone and not pick up their give-away signs, but he’s undecided as to what, so I’ll just wait for him to get his guts together to do it. I take the time to take in his clothing choice for the evening. His brown cowboy boots are scuffed from years of wear. I remember labelling them as stupid and pretentious when he first got them, cackling about how he doesn’t have to look like a stereotypical drama student, and he better watch out because if he carries on wearing them and doesn’t get his freaking hair cut soon people will start mistaking him for a girl. He was stubborn though, and refused to listen. I gave up after a while and the boots stayed. I think I’ve seen them every day since then, if not on his feet then stashed neatly away in a corner of his RV or slung in a corner of my room along with the rest of his stuff. I’ve even worn them a few times, because Beck despises my habit of driving bare footed, and he literally shoves them over the console and brandishes them in from of my face until I pull over and slip them on. Shoved, I guess I should say now. He won't be doing it again.

His shirt too is achingly familiar. It’s red and black plaid. For a couple of months last year it resided in my closet because I used to steal it off him so often and wear it around his RV, usually with nothing but my underwear and just the first three buttons done up, that he’d made a fuss and declared I wore it so often it might as well be mine. I’d taken him at his word and promptly stole it the next time I visited his RV. If he noticed he didn’t mind until one day at the end of summer, he’s spilt fruit punch down his white shirt. I’d told him to walk home topless, that if he ran, and didn’t stop and talk to anyone, especially cute girls, he’d be fine. He didn’t take to my advice very kindly and eventually I’d marched upstairs with a huff and thrown the shirt down for him to put on. He’d kind of reclaimed it after that. My visits to his RV became fewer and I didn’t need the shirt anymore, usually I just dressed and left soon after. I haven’t seen it in a while. It’s linked so firmly in my mind with evenings spent in his arms, the TV flickering in the background set to re-runs of long cancelled teen sit-coms that Beck seems to have an odd fetish for; and lazy mornings spent doing nothing but talking idly. I was wearing it when he asked if I’d thought about the future- what college I was thinking of after graduation, if I thought we should apply together, if I could see us together in another two years’ time? I’d shrugged and told him that it was too far away yet, that I preferred to live in the present. Life’s more exciting that way. Planning was for old people. The shirt is so connected to ‘The Story of Beck and Jade’ that it’s only fitting it should be present for the last chapter.

The wind twists the ends of my blue hair extensions in its fingers and Beck speaks again, finally.

‘Do I get to ask why?’ His mouth is skewed to the side, like he’s making the effort to not grimace and it’s not quite working. Instead his face looks pained and against popular belief, I do have a heart and it twinges at the sight. I don’t want to hurt Beck, I really don’t, but we’ve been pretending for far too long, and he must know that. I’m just putting an end to it now before it gets seriously out of control, before it takes us both down to levels we can’t recover from.

‘You know why, Beck. It hasn’t been right for a while, since the beginning of term. How much of this is just routine for you now?’ I ask him bluntly and watch carefully as he blanches but doesn’t answer right away. If I were wrong he would be protesting right about now. If I were wrong, he’d be stepping forward and stroking my hair and kissing my forehead. He’s not. Instead he stares at me for a second and his hands shift uneasily at his sides.

‘…I don’t know what to say.’ That’s Beck, ever expressive. I sigh and again my breath curls away from me, into the darkening night, and the only way I can see Beck is by the illumination from the street light near us, bathing us both in an orange glow, like something out of my zombie movies. It makes Beck’s usually dark skin look pale and drained. I must look positively like a ghost. I just shrug in response; to be honest we were never very good with communication. That was why we always resorted to text fighting, like some stereotypical teenage couple. When I screamed, Beck would either ignore me or just scream back.

‘Jade, are you sure about this? We’ve broken up before. Who’s to say we won’t be back together next month?’

I grit my teeth in irritation; I wanted him to take this seriously. ‘I mean it this time.’ My short answer seems to shock him, it was spoken with a lot of force, and his eyebrows furrow in….confusion?

‘So this is it?’ I nod. Slowly.

‘Don’t tell me you didn’t see this coming, Beck. I know you did. We haven’t seen each other much recently, and when we do, the most we do is make out so we can avoid any form of conversation or start a screaming match. You’re constantly annoyed at me, and you’re irritating me too and I’m sick of it. It’s gone beyond any jealousy you think I have. What we have- it's not good, Beck.’

This time he doesn’t seem affected by my frankness. He should have built up immunity by now anyhow. I can already feel him letting go, he’s slipping through my fingers, like water, and I don’t try and stop it this time. I just let him, because I’ve become tired of the fighting too. He steps forward and for a moment I think he’s going to try and shake me or something and I’m so confused but then he dips his head to meet mine and it ends with a slight kiss. It’s too quick for even me to react and he’s already stepping back with a small sad smile on his face. I must look pretty confused still because he shrugs deeply and says: ‘I must admit, I didn’t think we’d break up like this, I thought we’d at least go out with a bang or something.’ He shoves his hand deep in his jean pocket. ‘I don’t know which I prefer.’

I know what he’s talking about it. I never thought I’d be the one doing the breaking-up either, but time changes, and apparently so do people, otherwise we wouldn’t be in this mess. I’ve changed. This relationship has too and as much as I thought maybe we’d have a huge argument and that would be it, right now that sounds like a lot of effort and pain, and whilst I like pain, that wouldn’t be the good kind, and I like this method better. I’m sure Beck will realise he does too. I mean, it’s less pain for both of us, isn’t it?

‘Isn’t this more healthy?’ I ask and he shrugs again.

‘We were never the healthiest of couples though.’ True, the boy has a point. ‘You sure you don’t want to think about it. We can work through it, Jade.’

I know he’s not serious, I know he’s only saying it because he feels he has to. Beck always wants to say the right things. Comes with being an actor, I suppose. The streetlight flickers and for a second I lose sight of his face. I find it easier to say my next words because of this.  
‘Trust me Beck, we’re through. I don’t want this relationship anymore. I’m fed up with you paying me so little attention. I’m fed up with you putting up with advances from other girls. I’m fed up with us not talking. Just let it go.’ My voice is low, and try as I might, I can’t control the bitterness anymore, it seeps through and cracks my words in the middle with its acid.

A moment of silence, then- ‘Fine. If that’s the way you feel.’

‘It is,’ I grit out.

Again, all the fight seems to leave Beck’s body and he pushes his other hand in the matching pocket and rocks back on his heels cautiously. ‘I guess…we’re over. I’ll see you around Jade. But don’t like talk to me too soon okay? I just- don't.’

I just nod and even turn to leave, not wanting to stay any longer in this suffocating atmosphere of awkwardness, my black velvet skirt swishing around my waist, before I suddenly remember and call after Beck’s already retreating figure. 'You’re not going to Cat’s party?’ Cat is hosting a house party the next day in aid of celebrating her half-birthday. She begged us for weeks to come until we all eventually caved, and stopped telling her a half-birthday is no reason to throw a massive party, and promised we’d be there. I wondered if now Beck was planning to avoid it.

‘I don’t know. I don’t want to hurt Cat. I might make an appearance.’

I nod again and this time Beck turns away first and strides towards his truck. It feels odd not to be following him and climbing in to ride shotgun next to him, fiddling with the stereo knobs until they hit my favourite station. I watch him for a while until he enters the cab and his engine roars to life. I fish my keys out of my messenger bag and head off in the direction of my car and sigh in relief when the headlight’s flash after I press the unlock button. I’d forgotten where I’d parked it. I climb in wearily, slinging my bag onto the passenger seat and yanking the glove box open. It takes me a couple of seconds to find the cigarettes lurking in the back but when I find them I grab them gratefully.

I light the cigarette and take a long drag, closing my eyes in contentment when the nicotine enters my lungs and exhaling slowly as I watch the smoke blow in rings into my car interior. Reluctantly I crank the driver window down so it can escape and hang my hand out of the window so as not to get ash on the seat. It may be my car, but my father would kill me. I flick on my stereo and the familiar crashing of guitar rocks my car as Nirvana’s live album starts and Cobain’s scratchy voice bleeds through the speakers, into my ears. I listen as Kurt screams about heart shaped boxes and the volume is far too loud for this deserted parking lot, but frankly, I don’t give one. The music and the cigarette are keeping me from thinking too hard about the decision I just made, and whether it was the right one. The pounding drums infiltrate my head until I can’t tell whether it’s the stereo or my heartbeat because both are pretty loud right now, and everything else is so quiet. I’m sure if I switched off the music all I would hear is the rattling of my own breath and the beating of my own heart. Alone, because that was what I was now.

Eventually I finish my cigarette and flick the butt out the window and watch it smoulder on the concrete for a few seconds before it flickers out. I stop myself from making stupid parallels between the dying embers and mine and Beck’s relationship by throwing the car into reverse and pulling out of the lot and turning left onto the road. If I was going to Beck’s, I’d be turning right. But I’m not. The music has changed by now and Kurt has actually been replaced by the crooning voice of his widowed wife, as Hole is playing. It’s one of their few slow songs and Love’s voice wheedles out the chorus almost painfully. Sometimes I wonder why I like this kind of music.

_Remember you promised me,_  
 _I’m dying, I’m dying, please,_  
 _I want to, I need to feel ,_  
 _under your skin._

Beck’s face flashes before my eyes and I slam the off button on the cd with my whole fist and Courtney Love is abruptly shut off. I drive the rest of the way in home in silence. I run through a few stoplights but the roads are deserted and there’s no one out here to catch me, so I don’t care. The journey from school to home only takes twenty minutes and the roads fly past in blurred streaks of orange, grey and black all running in to each other outside my car window. I’m probably speeding too, but I can’t bring myself to care about getting at ticket for that either. The sad fact is I don’t care about much really, anymore.

The gravel crunches under my wheels as I pull into the drive-way. The porch light is on but none of the rest of the house is illuminated at all. My mother isn’t home. Not like I expected her to be. The last time I saw her was last week, for a brief couple of seconds as we passed in the hallway. I was heading to the kitchen and she was off to somewhere on the third floor. She didn’t make an appearance after, and I slammed the door on my way out. I don’t even know if she heard. I unlock the door then sling my keys into the glass bowl on the table intended exactly for that purpose. Both mother’s keys and car keys are gone, so it means she won’t be back for a while. At least definitely not tonight. Sometimes I wonder if she plans these things so as to avoid me as much as possible, to try and ignore the fact she’s got a bitter twisted arts kid as a daughter instead of a lawyer-in-training like she wanted. How must she live with the disappointment I cause?

I consider getting something to eat from the fridge, I know I should, I missed lunch and that was over 7 hours ago- the red clock from the oven blinks that’s it 22; 15pm, but I find my appetite is lacking and I trudge upstairs to my room, kicking off my boots as I enter. I don’t turn the light on immediately and all the jars I’ve filled with the stuff I‘ve collected from over the years, like the lump I took from the hospital, and painted with glow in the dark paint, loom out of the darkness. Turning my bedside lamp on I collapse on the bed and shrug off my top and skirt. I don’t even have the energy to find some night clothes before I crawl under the covers so I settle for my underwear.

When I shut out my lamp the light from the street filters through my flimsy curtains and I think about how I used to lie in Beck’s RV when he was asleep, just watching the little stars the LA night life allowed sparkle in the sky. I used to watch the streetlights across the road flicker out and then wait until they came on again around 4am. I used to do this in Beck’s arms. I won’t be doing it again. Tears prick at the corners of my eyes but I don’t allow them to progress any further. Jade West does not cry. It’s a weakness and vulnerability and I am not vulnerable, ever. But the image of Beck lying in his small bed watching the same stars I used to has crept behind my eyelids. Maybe he’s staring outside, remembering those nights too. Beck was safe, Beck was normal; Beck was reliable if anything else. Why am I acting like the hurt party here when I’m the one who made the decision? Call it off before it fizzles out completely; call it off before we end up seriously hurting each-other., that's what I thought. I miss him but I miss what he represents more- we’ve always been BeckandJade, this one entity. Oh god, what if he’s crying too? I can’t handle this. My eyes begin to sting again and I squeeze them closed. I hope he knows this wasn’t easy.

I fall asleep with Beck’s face and thoughts of tomorrow’s party flashing though my mind.


	2. In my head

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo, so here's the second chapter. You get a glimpse of Robbie, but don't expect any Rade yet. You're in for the long haul my friends.

_'And these fights, they climb through my veins like its mercury rising, and these nights, I seem to remember a home that was better' - Something Corporate, Not What It Seems  
.........._

I don't get up until it’s past twelve and my phone burbles loudly, seemingly straight into my ear. I can't believe I've slept that long. I roll out of bed groaning.  My clothes are wrinkled and creased from where they've ridden up in the night and I begin to regret not getting changed before collapsing last night. My phone falls out of the maze of bedding and pillows on my bed as I get up. I pick it up, rubbing my eyes, and look at it dispassionately. 3 messages from Cat, all in a state of hyper activity about this evening; one from Tori, which I half consider ignoring, asking for a lift there seeing as she still hasn’t managed to not completely bomb a driving test yet; and one from Robbie wondering if he should wear a tie. I rattle off a few messages to Cat, telling her to calm the fuck down, grudgingly agree to Tori and decide to click delete on Robbie’s message. The boy will figure it out, and if he does turn up in a tie it will set him up for my teasing for the rest of the night.

There are none from Beck. I don't know what I expected. I toss my phone back onto the bed.

The house is still silent and still when I stick my head out of the door and I find myself breathing a sigh of relief. I can't deal with my mother's interrogation right now, or awkward conversation over breakfast. She won't be interested anyway and I figured she stopped listening years ago, when she lost interest in me as her daughter, when I chose what I wanted to do with my life and it didn't quite meet up to her successful, hot-shot city girl lawyer expectations. My mother doesn't like being proved wrong and her own family is a constant reminder. Maybe that's why she avoids this house like it's got a red x painted over the front door. 

Anyway, I'm grateful at least for having the excuse for no conversation. Right now, I'm also not looking forward to tonight, and it's looming in the near future ominously. I sigh, I don't want to see people, make stupid small talk, or pretend that the inevitable atmosphere of awkwardness between me and Beck isn’t there. I don't want to see his face and be swept over by an overwhelming sense of guilt, don't want to have to explain to my friends what happened and assure them that ‘no, everything’s fine’, don't want to see him pursue Vega now that I'm not standing in his way anymore, or his stupid sense of self-righteousness. 

I don't want to do anything.

Unfortunately, I know that’s not possible, so I drag myself to the bathroom, pulling pins out of my hair from how I fixed it last night, and dropping them to the floor to create a Hansel and Gretel like trail for my mother to find later and fume about. I turn the shower on full power and the highest temperature it can go and stand beneath it frozen for a while, just feeling it run down my back and scald my skin and burn feeling into me again. My hair is scorching. The water feels like its branding and I like it because it blocks out everything else, means I don't have to think of anything apart from the boiling water slamming into me. I want it to get it hotter hotter until maybe, like the steam, I'll just evaporate too.

Eventually when my skin is clean and the bathroom is foggy I climb out and shiver in the polar conditions of the rest of the house. I dress in black jeans and a cami, grab my docs and my leather jacket, and walk out of the house. I need coffee, good coffee, and I need it now.

/

The queue at Skybucks is obnoxiously long when I arrive. I sigh and tap my foot impatiently until I reach the counter and the barista looks scared at the murderous expression on my face and the way I bark out my order.  I consider taking my vanilla latte to a booth and sitting down but I'm not risking bumping into anyone that I know so I stalk out. My feet carry me forward without any real direction until I find myself outside of a building I vaguely recognise about twenty blocks down. It’s only when a familiar head of gravity defying hair pops out of a upstairs window that I realise just where I am.

‘Jade?’

‘Oh hey, Shapiro,’ I respond unenthusiastically. He's’s seen me now and speed walking in the other direction would be a little ruder than I think I can get away with. He’s a freak, and crushed pretty easily. Besides, he deals with enough pain with his very much unrequited love of Cat for me to add any more right now.

‘Wait there!’ he cries out, and his black bushy hair disappears for a couple of seconds before the front door is thrown open and he’s standing in the doorway grinning. I roll my eyes.

‘Hi.’

‘What are you doing? You _never_ come to visit me. Do you want to come in or something?’

‘Uhh…sure.' There really is no way out. I down the rest of my coffee then flip the empty cardboard cup into a nearby trash can. Robbie’s house is big, but not as big as mine. It’s sparsely decorated and everything has the uncomfortable aura of being spotlessly clean. If I ran a finger down the banister I'm pretty certain I wouldn’t pick up a particle of dust. My house is just the opposite, stuff left everywhere because my mother has mind only for his work. I leave debris just to frustrate her. Robbie shuffles his feet awkwardly as I glance around his home. There’s some sort of muffled pop punk group being blasted from a room upstairs and I go to ask who it is,  but Robbie shrugs.

‘My sister’s home and we haven’t sound proofed her room yet. Uhh, about the house, my Mom’s a bit of a neat freak so…’ he trails off and I shrugs myself.

‘It’s cool. Better than mine.’

I realise that of one of us doesn't move thennwe're going to spend the rest of our lives standing awkwardly in this hallway so I kick of my boots and starts upstairs, eager to get to Robbie’s room if I'm going to stay here for a bit, and avoid all adults that may be lurking downstairs. Robbie scurries after me and I tries (not very hard) to suppress a laugh when we enter his room. It’s bright blue and covered in star wars merchandise, and like downstairs, everything is precisely in place. His bed is immaculately made with its Luke Skywalker bedcover, and Rex sits on a chair in the corner looking eerily dead. Robbie doesn’t go to pick him up, which relieves me. The overall effect is that a twelve year old boy lives here, not a teenager. 

‘Seriously Shapiro? Star wars?’ My smirk is probably very evident and Robbie’s cheeks heat up.

‘Hey, it’s a classic, award-winning series! With one of the biggest plot twists in movie history!’

‘Oh, please,’ I scoff, rolling her eyes. ‘I am your father?’ So predictable.’

‘It was not! It was the work of a great scriptwriter, who-‘

‘Whatever’ I cut him off and sit down on the edge of his bed while he remains standing hovering in the doorway of his own room, looking nervous. ‘You can come in, you know.’

‘Right.’

He sits at his desk chair, possibly as far away from the bed that he can get and eyes me warily. I, in turn, resist the urge to scream. I'm not going to bite his head off, not today, and I could really do with some conversation that might just take my mind off wondering what Beck is doing, and what he’s feeling, and if he’s thinking about me, and did I make the right decision, and should it hurt this much and on and on and on. I don't have to try with Shapiro, he’s just as much of a freak as I am but would never let anyone know. I just want some time where I don't have to care about anything much at all.

'Are you going to talk to me, or did you invite me in so you could look at me like I’m about to fire a bullet through your brain?’ 

He swallows and smiles weakly at my sarcasm. ‘It’s just you’re never around my part of town. Beck’s is over the other side, and we usually hang around Tori’s, and I thought you and Beck had plans today?’

I wince when I realise he was right. We were going to go to the cinema to see the latest paranormal activity film, so Beck could get scared and pretend he wasn’t, and so I could sit and mock the entire thing from beginning to finish. I'd forgotten, and had only mentioned it once at lunch a couple of days ago, and I'm pretty sure Beck hadn’t a clue either. That’s how much commitment to the relationship we'd sunk down to, that our friends knew more than we did. It was sad really. 

Robbie seems to notice the change in my expression, the wrinkles in my forehead, and he frowns at me. ‘Jade, are you and Beck alright? I mean, you’re here and he’s not and I know you don’t exactly like me, and-‘

I'd also forgotten how perceptive but equally pathetic Robbie was. ‘Shapiro, I’m mean to everyone.’ I take a breath in. ‘Beck and I broke up.’ It seems so stark, out there in the open, so blunt and irreversible. I'm not sure I like it. It feels real now, not something just between the two of us that we can change- forget and kiss and make up like we usually do. Not something we can ignore and pretend like it never happened, like most of our fights. This is it, it's done, and now people know. 

Robbie stares at me.

‘Like for real?’

‘Yes. For real this time.’

I'm going to get this reaction a lot, I know- people not taking me seriously. Because that’s what Beck and I did- we fought and broke up time and time again and it didn’t mean anything, that was just how we worked, and we loved each other really, underneath all the screaming matches and cold shoulders and every other god damn fight.

Or did we?

‘Oh.’ There’s a semi-awkward pause. ‘Are you okay?’ he asks. 

I nod. I'm fine. It was my decision anyway, right? I should deal with this. I _can_ deal with this.

‘The text? Don’t wear the tie. Just don’t, Shapiro.’

Robbie blinks at me for a second, then seems to catch on to my abrupt change of subject and fumbles for words to defend himself. 

‘Why not? It’ll look smart I’ll-‘

‘Shapiro, you’ll either look like you’re attending a freaking funeral and turned up dressed grossly inappropriately, or you’ll look like you wandered into the wrong wedding reception. It’s a college party. No tie, period.’

‘Fine.’

‘Well, do you want to sit here staring at each other, or do you want to actually do something?’

‘Jade, are you sure you’re…I mean we can talk about-‘

‘No. Now put the tele on or something. Christ, you need to learn when to shut up, Shapiro.’

He flinches at the sudden venom in my voice and cringes away from her. I almost feel bad. ‘Sorry’ he mumbles, and reaches over to the flick the small ancient TV on his desk on. For the next couple of hours we watch cartoons on some random kids network and I roll my eyes when he sits on the remote and the Spanish subtitles get stuck showing, so we talk along in Spanish instead and I laugh a couple of times when Robbie pronounces something completely wrong and he smiles at me when I correct him. When I leave to get ready for Cat’s I realise I've been there nearly four hours and it feels weird to know I spent that much time, alone, with Robbie without wanting to take a baseball bat to his head or something. 

I tell him I'll see him later and he watches me walk down the drive until I disappear behind the hedge round his house.

/

Jessica West is nota very good mother. I know this, but yet she is a far better parent than my father, and that's saying something. Michael West made a mistake three years ago when he married an air-head, controlling, useless, superficial and sponging blonde women without any of his family’s (mine) blessing. And now there is women in the world parading around in designer clothes, addressing herself as my 'step-mother.'

Their apparent romance was whirlwind and within the space of one year my mother had moved out and this new women had moved in, a slim gold band already sparkling on her left hand. We had had no choice in the matter. My mother had discovered them in bed together one sunday morning after coming home from a business trip. It was so fucking cliche, and what was worse was that I was in the house at the time. Twelve years old and told in a hushed and frantic whisper to stop me crying out at the strange women in my house, a hand in my hair nervously stroking my head- _don't tell mommy darling_. I wasn't stupid, I knew what was going on. I could have lessened her mother's heartbreak by telling her first, I sometimes think. But would that be worse? Being told by your own almost-teenage daughter about your cheating husband like you had no control, hold over your own life anymore? Either way, my mother left and tok me with her, and the rest, as they say, is bad blood and messy legal papers and court procedures. 

I think she'd like to imagine the whole marriage never happened, at any cost. Even if it means forgetting her child most days of the year. Maybe that's another reason why she hates me- I'm a constant reminder of the one thing in life she couldn't keep and make perfect- her marriage. And now she has to admit that my father has found someone 'better' than her, and my mother hates being second best. It goes against every nerve in her body and I walk around her house reminding of her of the one thing she failed in and maybe that's why she looks at me like she'd rather I faded into the floor.

Love, I decided very early on, is bullshit.

I think of Beck and stick my key into the door.

/

Inside, I'm very surprised to see my mother walking down the stairs in a long violet evening dress, her hair immaculately styled in a neat up-do. I grit my teeth when she brushes past me, hooking an earring into her ear and muttering about her handbag, whilst doing her best to ignore the fact that I'm staring in the hall and glaring at her. I cough pointedly. She whirls around from where she's been fishing in her handbag and faces me, an eyebrow raised. Sometimes, I understand where I get my mannerisms from, and I hate the fact that she and I are more alike than I'd care to admit.

'Yes, hello. It's your daughter.' Sarcasm drips from my tongue. She doesn't seem to appreciate it.

'Don't try to be smart with me Jadelyn. And can't you see that I'm getting ready to go out? Not that you bother yourself with my life.' I almost laugh in her face at the irony of it all. I don't think she bothered to even learn Beck's name until we were together for a year and I've spent more nights at his place than I have home recently and she hasn't asked about it _once_. Because she does't care. As long as I don't wind up in hospital or on reality tv she couldn't give a fuck. 'And where were you all day?'

She's not actually interested, of course. 'Out.'

'Out where?' I pause in climbing the stairs and wince at the dangerously high pitched tone of her voice. I curl my hand around the stairs banister tightly to try and block her nasal voice out. Her heavy jewellery jangles as she steps forward, her eyebrows drawn into a a tight frown.

'I was just out. And I have a party this evening, so don't expect me home. Why are you so dolled up then? Did God perform a miracle and you finally got a date?' 

She makes a harrumph of irritation and adjusts the bracelets on her wrist and checks her brunette curls in the hall mirror. 'I'm going to a corporate dining event.'

I laugh darkly. 'Of course. It's work work work isn't it? You have fun drinking cheap champagne Mom and trying to look important.'

'Jadelyn, less of your lip!' She aims me a glare but I roll my eyes. 

'Anything else, Mom?'

'Who's party is it?' she asks sharply.

'Cat's.'

'The red-haired girl?'

My mother and Cat have met countless times but still she can't find it in that apparently over-loaded head of hers to remember any of my friends, their names, or the slightest detail about them. And she wonders why I never tell her anything. There would be no point. 'Yes' I grit out, already starting up the stairs again, my back combat boots leaving nice black marks in the cream carpet. 

'Jade, don't walk away from me!'

'Have fun tonight Mom. I won't text you!' I call over my shoulder as she glowers up at me from the foot of her stairs. Her cheeks look oddly flushed with the layer of blusher she's put on and the conversation we've just had. There'a vein pulsing in her forehead and her hair is beginning to escape from its pins. She looks like she's about to add something more so I run up the rest of the stairs and kick open my door and go straight to my wardrobe, flinging it open.

The front door slams downstairs.

There's a lot of black in my wardrobe. Black is good. Black is dark and angry and black is a warning to stay away. Black is what I need right now. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you enjoyed it, please leave a review. I'm taking them as my valentine's day presents...

**Author's Note:**

> Reviews are love, and like they say, love makes the world go round. Or that might be chocolate. Same thing. Anyway, thoughts?


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